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Saturday, August 17, 2013

Poetry revision is no different than revising our other writing

Every morning during the poetry workshop I
attended last week at Esalen, one of our three instructors gave us a poetry
craft talk. The workshop, called Writing and Knowing and led by Ellen Bass,
Dorianne Laux, and Joseph Millar, gave me a lot of new information about how to write - and revise - poetry. As promised, I'm going to try to relate some
of the things this wise trio of poets taught us.

Ellen discussed
revision - and this information sounded very much like what I've heard about
revising memoirs, novels, and works of non fiction. Revising poems takes
a lot of work. As she said, we must work at it. In fact, she said, good poets
like to revise. Here are some of her hints:

Keep
original versions so you can go back and compare

Simply cut
out the bad parts - easier said than done

Distinguish
between the essential and non-essential

Pretend
it isn’t your poem when you sit down to revise - I love this idea

National Association of Memoir Writers

About Me

Madeline SharplesI’ve worked most of my professional life as a technical writer, grant writer, and proposal process manager and began writing poetry, essays, and creative non-fiction when my oldest son, Paul, was diagnosed as manic depressive. I continued writing as a way to heal since his death by suicide in 1999. My memoir, "Leaving the Hall Light On," first released on Mother's Day 2011 in hard cover, is about living with my son's bipolar disorder and surviving his suicide. My publisher, Dream of Things, is launching a paperback edition in July 2012 and an eBook in August 2012. I also co-edited Volumes 1 and 2 of "The Great American Poetry Show," a poetry anthology, and wrote the poems for two books of photography, "The Emerging Goddess" and "Intimacy." Besides having many poems published in print and online magazines, I write regularly for several websites: Naturally Savvy, PsychAlive, Open to Hope,and Journeys Through Grief and occasionally for The Huffington Post. I maintain two blogs: Choices and at Red Room.